


Why Did You Come Back?

by QuidditchSeason1977



Series: Writer's Workshop - Flash Fiction Edition [2]
Category: The Hobbit - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Everyone Lives/Nobody Dies, Dwarven Ones | Soulmates, Established Relationship, F/M, Female Bilbo Baggins, Female Bilbo Baggins/Thorin Oakenshield, Fluff, Post-Canon, Reunions
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-06
Updated: 2020-08-06
Packaged: 2021-03-05 21:15:03
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,610
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25741921
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/QuidditchSeason1977/pseuds/QuidditchSeason1977
Summary: Brianna Baggins is quite convinced that her One, Thorin Oakenshield, died during the Battle of Five Armies and returns to the Shire with a quite unexpected final gift from her One. Five years after her return, Bag End receives some unexpected visitors...
Relationships: Bilbo Baggins/Thorin Oakenshield
Series: Writer's Workshop - Flash Fiction Edition [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1866859
Comments: 5
Kudos: 215





	Why Did You Come Back?

**Author's Note:**

> Written for prompt #13 of my Writer's Workshop - Flash Fiction Edition list, which is a list of 52 prompts that are supposed to be written as quickly as possible (time limit - 2 hours) and be about 500 - 1000 words in length.
> 
> Yeah, I did a terrible job at sticking to that last bit for this one, but it was the story that wanted to be told for this prompt. So... that's that, I guess.
> 
> The full prompt list can be found on the series page.
> 
> I don't own anything from The Hobbit.

Brianna Baggins was quite certain that if her dear parents had still been alive, they would have died of shock upon seeing their daughter now. Or at least her father would have. She was 42 and unmarried, had been on an _adventure_ , and had two children. Many hobbits had asked for her hand upon her return from her adventure (despite the oddity of her having _gone_ on said adventure in the first place) but they would be disappointed. And, once the fact that her daughters’ father had been a dwarf became apparent (although _what_ the opinion had been before that Brianna hadn’t the faintest idea – she’d left in the company of dwarrow and returned pregnant. Hobbits might not be the brightest, but she would have thought you wouldn’t need to be in order to draw the correct conclusion there) even those pity offers had dried right up.

Even many of those that Brianna had thought were her friends had stopped speaking to her – although that was less of a surprise. Indeed, her only real company these days (five years after her return, six from when she had left the Shire) were her children and her cousin, Primula Brandybuck. And Primula’s company would soon become less available, once she married her intended (Brianna’s other cousin Drogo Baggins).

But Brianna had decided that she would be fine. She had her girls and she convinced herself that was all she needed in order to be happy.

…Although she did wish that _he_ had survived that terrible battle…

At any rate, since Primula had already arrived for tea, Brianna was quite surprised when at 4 o’clock on the dot there was a firm knock at the door.

She looked at Primula, who was not ignorant to her cousin’s social circumstances, in surprise. Evidently, she took too long as just before she was about to open the door the knocking came again – much firmer this time. “Yes, calm down, I’m coming,” she said crossly as she opened the door. “Now, what is it you want…” she trailed off as she registered just who was at her door. “Dwalin?” she said in surprise.

“Aye, lass,” he said. “Is tea still at 4?”

Brianna grinned widely, “Of course it is, you must come in at once!” She began to move out of the doorway, “Oh I have missed all of you. How is everyone? You must tell me everything that has happened since I left. But you didn’t travel all this way by yourself, did you?” She paused as the thought occurred to her.

“Nay, lass,” Dwalin said, “I brought another with me I thought you might like to see.”

With that, puzzling statement, he moved into the smial and revealed the dwarf who had been standing behind him. Brianna stood quite still as she registered who it couldn’t possible be… but it seemed to be that it was. “Thorin?” she said softly. “It can’t be. I thought you’d died.” She looked more closely at him. “I thought… But why did you come back?”

“Aye, my love, it’s me,” came the voice she knew so well and the sound of it nearly brought her to tears. “And I’ve come back because I’ve missed you so very much. I would have come sooner, but my recovery was not swift and then there were matters that had to be settled before I could come, but please believe me that at the very first opportunity I slipped away to see you again.”

“I… Thorin, it is so good to see you and I am very glad you have come, but… how are you alive? I had thought you died. It is why I left so quickly.”

“Brianna?” Primula called from down the hall. “Who is at the door?”

“Some friends of mine,” she called back to Primula. “Come in, we can discuss it over tea,” she said to both dwarrow. “Shoes off, if you please.”

Both dwarrow pulled off their boots and left their swords in the entryway. Brianna smiled to see it. “You remember where the kitchen is, I’m sure?” Dwalin snorted in agreement and led the way down the hall. Brianna paused a moment and said to Thorin in wonder, “Your beard… it’s so much fuller now.”

He smiled at her, her favorite smile – the one that was just for her – and said softly, “I have no need for mourning now.”

Brianna smiled at him but before she could say anything, there was a crash that came from the girls’ room followed by crying. Blood drained from her face as she recalled what she would have to tell Thorin. Her stomach curled into a knot as she thought of all the ways he could react to the news.

The cry was joined by a second one and she hurried down the hall, not bothering to see if Thorin or Dwalin followed her (Primula, she knew, would wait in the kitchen). She paused in the doorway to the bedroom and took in the damage. Neither girl appeared to be hurt, just scared by the crash. The crash appeared to have come from when Bronwyn (she so had her father’s temperament) had thrown her cloth doll at the lamp after waking from her nap and had knocked it to the ground.

“Oh, did you scare yourself with the loud noise?” Brianna said to Bronwyn as she moved into the room to pick her up from the large cradle she shared with her sister Tara. Both girls kept crying and Brianna wished dearly she had more hands as she started to shift Bronwyn so that she could pick up Tara as well.

A sharp intake of breath came from the doorway and then footsteps came into the room and familiar arms picked up Tara. “Shh, little one, all is well,” a soothing, low voice said. Brianna looked across the cradle to see Thorin holding Tara close to his chest, rocking the girl. Her heart ached at the sight. She had always wished for Thorin to meet his daughters and now…

Tara was starting to calm now, seeming to sense she was safe in her father’s arms, but Bronwyn was not. Brianna turned her attention to her daughter, rocking her and murmuring gently to her. Eventually, both girls’ sobs had subsided, and all was right in their world once more. Tara had started to study her father, and Brianna had to stifle giggles as she realized that the expression on Tara’s face was quite like the expression Thorin made when he was faced with something he did not quite understand. Bronwyn was content to lay on her mother’s shoulder and play with her hair.

“I had not realized you had married,” Thorin said lowly. “I can leave, if my presence here is an issue.”

Brianna startled. Had he not realized that they were his daughters? How could he believe that she would settle for another after his death? They were Ones, there could not be another better match for her.

“I have not married,” she said, “nor do I wish for you to leave.” She took a deep breath. “They are your daughters, Thorin. You are currently holding Tara, our eldest, and I have Bronwyn – our slightly younger daughter.” She watched as Thorin’s whole being seemed to freeze and added, “If you are going to yell at me for this, I would prefer for you to wait until later, as I have no wish to calm the twins again.”

That seemed to shake him out of his daze. “I am not going to yell at you. But… why didn’t you send word? Or return once they were old enough to travel?”

But Brianna heard what he was really asking. _Did you not want me to know my daughters?_

“It was nothing like that, Thorin,” she said. “I had quite thought you dead until just now. As for why I did not tell the others, well, I did not wish to deprive Fili of what is rightfully his. He will be a wonderful king. But if I had known you lived, I would have returned the instant that I could.”

She did not say _I feared that I would not be good enough to raise a king’s daughters in the eyes of your people._

Thorin nodded, considering this. “I agree about Fili, he _will_ make a wonderful king. But that doesn’t mean that Tara wouldn’t make a fine queen or that the Company wouldn’t have wanted to know of her. But I understand your fears. I wish I had known, but now that I do, I will not waste a second longer. If you do not wish to return to the Mountain, I understand. I will have to return once more, to officially abdicate, but then I will return to the Shire-“

“Thorin,” Brianna cut him off, “would you truly be happy in the Shire? Because it has never been that I do not wish to live in the Mountain, though I am sure it will be an adjustment. It has always been that I do not wish to live without _you_.”

Thorin paused, then reached over with his free arm and carefully pulled her and Bronwyn to him and held them there. “I have missed you so much these long years. How long until you can be ready to leave?”

Brianna grinned at him, “I think a week should be sufficient time. Does that sound acceptable?”

Thorin returned her grin, “Perfectly so, my love.”

Brianna reached up to hook her free arm around his neck and tugged it down so she could reach his lips. “Good,” she whispered as she kissed him.


End file.
